


Never Too Late

by WildwingSuz



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-26
Updated: 2015-04-26
Packaged: 2018-03-25 21:15:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3825316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WildwingSuz/pseuds/WildwingSuz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It all comes down to trust—and love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Never Too Late

**Author's Note:**

> I originally conceived this simply as a long smut piece with lots of sex scenes and had no clue it was going to turn into the serious work it did. I did a good bit of research on conditioning, women’s sexual problems, and so-called frigidity before I finished this. Unlike most of my stories this took a good couple of months to complete—but my motto has always been ‘if you’re going to do it, do it right’.  
> I’m also not one who’s much for poetry but luckily I knew enough to find the poems I thought would fit best near the end.   
> Thanks to the stories “Aphrodisia” by Kristel St. Johns and “Worth Breaking” by Narida Law for the base idea and inspiration. I aspire, my masters!
> 
> Spoilers: Mild for all things (where it starts), Brand X, and Fight Club.
> 
> Cory, I can’t thank you enough for all your hard work on this story, I really can’t. It wouldn’t be a tenth of what it ended up as without your careful eye for detail.

Never Too Late  
Rated NC-17 for adult sexual situations  
By Suzanne L. Feld

 

When she kissed me back I nearly passed out. I hadn’t meant to wake her up so soon after she dozed off but I bumped the end table while getting up and her eyes popped open. Without even thinking about it I sat down next to her again and slid my arm around her shoulders, pulling her gently against me, unable to resist the sudden, desperate need to hold her. Her face tilted up to mine questioningly and, just like I had on New Year’s Eve a few months back, I leaned down and kissed her.

But this time, instead of just pressing our lips together, mine were parted and hers opened. My heart was already pounding and my head swam when I felt her tongue meeting mine with no hesitation. I finally let go and kissed her the way I had wanted to for so long, losing all my inhibitions and thoughts and misgivings. She was a desirable, incredibly beautiful woman and I the man who loved and needed her; to hell with my job and her career and the FBI and any other damn thing that had kept us apart so long.

The time was here, finally, at long last. I knew it and, I hoped, so did she.

When the kiss ended I held her against me, running my fingers through her thick, soft hair. “God, Scully, I need you,” I breathed against the crown of her head. Suddenly tired of the line we’d danced along for so long and the innuendo and the seemingly endless bullshit, I said, “Will you come to bed with me?”

She heaved a tremulous sigh against my shoulder, soft and breathy. She tilted her head back to look at me and said softly, “Of course I will, Mulder.”

I stood, lifting her with me as the blanket fell away, and walked around the end of the couch with my arm still around her. I let her precede me into the bedroom but when I went over to turn on the bedside lamp she stopped me with a hand on my arm, saying quietly, “I prefer the darkness, Mulder.”

“Oh.” I would rather have had the light but maybe she was a bit shy at first; I could deal with that. It seemed a bit odd but I gave it no more thought considering where we were and what we were about to do, and as there were plenty of other things for me to worry about. There was just enough ambient light from the other room and through the windows that we could see well enough, I decided. I reached for her but she was leaning over, pushing her skirt down, and I decided that getting undressed was a bit more important than kissing her again. We had the rest of the night for kissing, not to mention many other things…

By the time I’d gotten my clothes off she was already in my bed, the comforter pulled up to her shoulders. I slid under the cool sheets next to her, sucking in my breath as my bare legs touched hers and I gathered her into my arms. I got up on one elbow and leaned over her slightly as she was still lying on her back. “I was beginning to think that this day would never come,” I breathed as I let my free hand wander over her soft skin, feeling the gentle contours of her smooth, naked body with the covers still over us. How I wished I could see her! “I have wanted you for so long, Scully… God, how I need you.”

She lay passively beside me, letting me touch her but not touching me in return, rather to my surprise. I’d seen her looking at me more than once over the years and was pretty damn sure she was physically attracted to me. Her body was completely limp and relaxed and not responding to my touch at all. I wondered if something was wrong or if it was shyness; that didn’t seem to be a normal part of Scully’s personality but we’d never gone to bed before so how did I know?

I gently cupped a breast and let my fingers brush her nipple; I found it already hard and erect so I knew that I was having some effect on her, at least. Maybe she was nervous, I thought through the growing erotic haze of my own almost-desperate arousal. I was so hard it was almost painful and every part of my body and mind was urging me to dive into her. “Scully… do you want me?” I finally muttered hoarsely, leaning so far over that I was nearly on top of her, pressing my erection against her hip. I let my hand wander down over her flat, quivering belly and felt my heart leap when I found her crisp curls, moving lower as she spread her legs to find her labia softly swollen and very wet. She felt like raw silk. In any case, I could smell her excitement; no matter how long it had been, I knew that arousing scent.

She turned slightly, throwing one arm around my neck and urging me over on top of her. “God, yes—I love you,” she whispered so low I barely heard her, but it snapped any restraint I was feeling. She was clearly ready for me despite her quiet stillness; I sank a gentle finger into her tight, wet opening and felt her inner muscles contract in response, though she made no sound.

“Oh, Jesus, I need you so badly I can’t wait and I’m afraid it won’t last long,” I whispered as I moved over on top of her. “But I’ll make it up to you later—we have all night.”

She spread her legs even more and moved both arms up around my shoulders, holding me down on her as I settled into the cradle of her hips. I didn’t want to poke at her randomly so I lifted up enough to reach down and guide myself into her, and she buried her face against my chest as I did. Despite my haze of urgent desire I was beginning to wonder what was going on—something didn’t feel right but I didn’t know what it was.

I felt myself gradually entering her tight softness and was unable to help a groan escaping—this was a watershed moment of my life. “Oh, Scully, I love you too, so much,” I groaned, turning my head and seeking her mouth, but all I could find was her hair.

It was then that the proverbial light went on over my head as I realized that she wasn’t responding at all and avoiding my attempts to kiss her—that was what was bugging me was wrong. Her body was accepting me; she was hot, tight and very wet, clearly physically aroused as I slid a few inches in with her natural lubrication easing the way despite my size. But otherwise she was just laying there motionless with her calves thrown over mine, arms around my shoulders, and face pressed against my shoulder without moving, not thrusting back at me or touching me other than where our bodies met. Something wasn’t right; I didn’t know what, but this was suddenly not working for me. It was like having a dash of cold water poured over me. I pulled out, already softening, and lifted up on my arms over her. “Scully, what the hell is going on?” I asked, trying to keep my voice level and not show my sudden frustration. “Why are you acting so strange?”

“Oh, God, did I screw it up?” she said, covering her eyes with one hand. “I was afraid of that.”

“You didn’t screw anything up, I just don’t understand what’s going on. Don’t you want me? Am I reading you wrong?” I still had the lower half of my body pinning her down although I was up on my arms gazing down at her. 

“I’m—I’m not a slut, Mulder, and I won’t fake it with you,” she said from behind her hand. “Let me up.”

“No,” I said softly but firmly. “I’m not letting you run away from me this time, Scully. We are going to talk about this.”

I saw her nostrils flare though she didn’t move a muscle otherwise. Even now her body was totally relaxed and passive beneath mine. “There’s nothing to talk about,” she said flatly. “If you don’t, uh, like the way I, uh… make love… then there’s nothing more to discuss.”

“I might if you showed me how you felt!” I said rather heatedly. “You’re just laying there! I’ve had more action out of a blow-up doll!”

Now she moved her hand and glared up at me. “I told you, I’m no slut! Get off of me!”

I knew better than to let her go now. “Not until you tell me what’s wrong.”

“Nothing’s wrong other than that you apparently want me to be something I’m not. Goddamn it, Mulder, I haven’t had sex in a good six years or more, what did you expect?”

“A woman who shows me how she feels,” I said bluntly. She was still completely unmoving beneath me, which was more than a little odd. “A woman with the passion in bed she shows in the rest of her life.”

“Passion?” she snorted. “I’m not one of those women you watch in those movies that aren’t yours, Mulder. I’m a real woman with real feelings and I don’t go screaming and moaning and pretending to feel more than I do.”

“I couldn’t tell that you were feeling anything,” I said, forcefully tamping back my annoyance. Something was nagging at me, something about the way she was talking or something she was saying… I don’t have a degree in psychology for nothing even if I don’t use it much. If I could just stay calm and keep my cool I was sure I could figure it out. “Seriously, Scully, you are just lying here like… like you’re with someone you don’t like and just enduring it. Don’t you feel anything for me?”

“Oh, God, of course I do! Couldn’t you feel my… physical reactions to you? That should tell you how I feel.”

“Then why won’t you look at me? Kiss me? Touch me?”

She shook her head, eyes still averted. “I told you, I am not a slut.”

There—that was it. That was the third time she’d used the word slut. “Dear God, Scully, don’t you think I know that of all women on this planet you’re the least likely to be a slut? Why would you think that I might see you that way?”

“Look, Mulder, I do not want to talk about this now. Let me up.”

I lowered the upper half of my body back down to hers, holding myself up on my elbows and almost nose-to-nose with her. “No. Not until I find out what’s going on with you. I’ve been looking forward to making love to you for so many years now that I’m not going to let it end like this.”

“Like what? That you can’t accept who and what I am?” she snapped, turning to glare at me before looking away again. Good, at least I was getting some reaction out of her.

“This isn’t you, Scully. This isn’t the strong, vibrant, passionate woman that I’ve worked beside for the last seven years. This is a pale imitation of her.”

I saw her jaw flex as she gritted her teeth, but it was a token resistance as her body was still totally limp beneath mine. She was talking spiritedly, but her body belied that stronger emotion. “You don’t know as much about me as you think you do, Mulder.”

Then something hit me, a thought that gave me pause. “Is it your religion, Scully? Do you think that a good Catholic girl is supposed to be this passive in bed?”

She shook her head, closing her eyes. “No. It’s got nothing to do with that. This is just the way I… am.”

I was getting honestly annoyed with her dodges and damn near got off of her and said something like, if that’s the case then forget it. With any other woman I probably would have. But I still felt that she was hiding something important from me, that it wasn’t that simple, and I persisted gently but firmly. “I don’t believe that, Scully. I don’t believe it at all. You’re a strong woman, a strong person, with strong passions and beliefs. Why would you just shed all that with your clothes?”

“Because I’m not a slut or a whore,” she said again, then sighed. “Why do you keep asking me that?”

“Why do you keep giving me the same answer when I’ve already assured you that I know you’re not a slut?” I countered. Another light blossomed over my head. “Scully, did someone tell you that   
responding to sexual stimulation is being a slut?”

Now her body bucked beneath mine and she glared into my eyes. “Get the hell off of me, Mulder, I mean it. I’ll hurt you.”

I bit my lower lip, afraid that perhaps she’d been forced or raped and this was the wrong thing to do. But somehow I didn’t think that was the case and that this was indeed the right way to handle it if I wanted to find out what was going on with her and salvage our relationship. Physically I was holding her torso down with mine but her arms, legs, and head were free. She could have removed me with one well-placed head-butt, heel of hand to my nose, yanking my hair, or even knee up between my legs at any time if she’d really wanted to get me off of her. “You won’t hurt me, Scully,” I said confidently. “But I’m not letting you up until you come clean with me.”

“Damn you!” she swore viciously, looking away. “Mulder, what the hell does it matter? We’re sexually incompatible; don’t keep humiliating me about it.”

Now her body was thrumming with tension beneath me and if the situation weren’t so dire it would have aroused me again. But there was far more here than sex; it could mean the end to our partnership, friendship, even us ever seeing each other again in any way. 

“No humiliation intended,” I told her softly. “Scully, tell me what’s wrong. Tell me who gave you the idea that a woman reacting normally to sexual stimulation is a slut.”

“More like who hasn’t,” she said sullenly, looking away again.

“I haven’t,” I pointed out, shifting slightly as my back was beginning to ache from the position. “In fact, I think that the more a woman shows how good I make her feel, the better.” I was carefully objectifying a partner here, specifically not saying “you” or “us” so that she wouldn’t feel like I was picking on her. “It arouses me and is better for me sexually when a woman responds to me honestly, showing what she’s feeling and telling me what she wants me to do to her.”

Scully snorted in a very derisive manner. “Right. That’s what men will say but not what they want when they get a woman into bed.”

We were getting close, I felt. “I’ve already got you in bed and I’m telling you I prefer a woman to act natural,” I pointed out. “What kind of men do you think want a woman to just lay there?”

She shrugged, then rested her hands on my shoulders; her body beneath mine was relaxing but not totally limp. This was clearly progress. “Men who are older, more experienced, who know how a woman should behave in bed.”

Willis and/or Waterston was my guess. Stupid bastards, both of them, if they’d been the ones to make her feel this way. “I’m not an older man but I know what I like in a woman too,” I said carefully. “You’re with me, Scully, not them. I want you to be yourself and not any other way.”

She glanced up at me almost fearfully or angry, I couldn’t tell which. “I’ve heard that before, Mulder.”

“Not from me,” I replied just as quickly. 

“No, from someone our own age. It’s not just older men who’ve told me they prefer me like this.”

“Don’t you believe me? Trust me?”

“Well, yeah, but…”

“But nothing, Scully. Trust me. Believe me.” I heaved a sigh. Here was the big chance I had to take; I couldn’t lay on her all damn night and my back and arms and shoulders were really getting sore by this point. “I love you for the person you are and I want you just the way you are but I’m pretty damn sure that this isn’t it. I think this is what someone else has conditioned you to be and that’s not going to work for me. If you can’t be honest with me there’s no hope for us. If you can, I promise you that I’ll be here in any and every way I can.” I leaned down and kissed her cheek, then her temple which was as close to her forehead as I could get, then lifted myself with a groan and collapsed onto the bed at her side, shaking out my arms. 

To my relief and surprise she didn’t move other than to roll on her side facing me, pulling the covers up to her armpits (and mostly over me as well) and staring at me with a slight frown. “Mulder… if you don’t like the way I am in bed, why are you picking at me like this?”

“Scully, it’s not that. I can tell that this isn’t how you want to respond, it’s how you think you should. If I really thought that lying there passively was how you honestly felt I wouldn’t be here right now, we’d probably be done and asleep after the last few days we’ve each had.”

She arched one dark auburn brow at me, propping her head on one hand with her elbow bent beneath it. “So you’re telling me that you want a woman like the ones in your movies who moan and writhe and scream out your name?”

I mirrored her pose facing her, not touching her but making sure she could see that she had my full attention. “No, absolutely not. I want a woman who shows me what she feels, be it no noise at all or shouting the place down. You know, I got a sweater for Christmas but I wanted—“

“—a moaner or a screamer, I know, I’ve heard that one,” she said with some exasperation, but I was very encouraged. She was almost back to the Scully I saw every day and knew and loved, not the limp automaton she had been a few minutes ago. “But Mulder, I—“

“Let’s drop the word ‘but’,” I said firmly but not antagonistically. “Scully, please tell me why you think that a man would prefer a totally passive woman. I really want—and need—to know. I’m not going to give up easily, you know. Didn’t you once call me a terrier with a bone when I got my teeth into something?”

She gave me The Look before dropping her eyes but not moving. I kept expecting her to leap out of my bed every time I opened my mouth but luckily I seemed to be saying the right things and hoped I would continue to do so. 

“Look, I’m not some sheltered virgin who hasn’t been with more than one man. I never slept around but there have been four—five—men in my bed before you, two of which were our age and one of whom I was engaged to. Every one of them seemed to want the same thing from me during sex, Mulder. That was to lie quietly and enjoy, not get wild and moan and carry on. Now it’s just the way I am.”

I frowned slightly. “Scully… have you ever had an orgasm with a man?”

“Jesus, Mulder! That’s a bit personal!” For all her outrage she wasn’t moving away and I decided to push it.

I yanked the covers off of us so strongly that they flew off the end of the bed, out of reach unless one of us got up and retrieved them. “You don’t think this is personal?” I said in a calm voice, gesturing to our naked bodies, which were still very visible despite the lack of direct light. She immediately tried to cover up but I reached out and simply held her forearm with no fuss, no force and she subsided, though she had her legs drawn up against her belly and her free arm across her breasts. “No, Scully, this is how it should be. I would love to look at your naked body and you should like to look at mine… don’t you?”

She was blushing a furious crimson… but, again, not moving away or getting up. It was sinking into me that perhaps she wanted this talk, that she likely knew she had a problem and wanted to solve it even if she couldn’t bring herself to face either fact head-on unlike the way she handled most of her problems. “I do… like to look at you, Mulder, but this… I really am more comfortable under the covers.”

“I know you are but I can’t see your magnificent body under there. I wish I could put the light on but I won’t push you any further right now,” I said, still lightly holding her forearm just below where her head rested on her hand. “Scully, I want to help you but I’m not sure I’m the right person to—“

“Help me? What makes you think I need help?” Now she did pull away, but only to sit up and curl over her drawn-up knees. “I’m fine the way I am, Mulder.”

I drew a deep breath and sat up cross-legged to face her. I caught her eyes shifting over me, lingering for a few seconds on my groin. I had never gone completely soft despite everything. “No, Scully, I have to tell you that you’re not,” I said, carefully choosing my words. “I haven’t been with a lot of women myself but those I have slept with didn’t just lay there as if they were bored. They participated, and not like the bimbos in the porn movies. Even if they weren’t very good—and some weren’t, trust me—I at least knew I was having an effect on them and that they were mentally here with me. They touched and looked at me, I looked at them, and we connected even if just for the time we were in bed.”

I swear I saw her hackles go up and wondered if I’d said the wrong thing, alluding to Diana and Phoebe. “So, what, Mulder, you want to help me get over my… frigidity?”

Interesting word for her to use; it seemed that she was aware that the way she acted wasn’t usual despite her denials. “I don’t know that I can, I’m too close to you,” I said. “I think perhaps you should see a psychiatrist who specializes in sexual… dysfunction.”

I almost winced as I said the last word but she didn’t seem to take it amiss; it later occurred to me that using the clinical term probably helped. She thought it over for a few moments, gazing over my shoulder and then her eyes met mine firmly. “I don’t want to go to a stranger, Mulder,” she said without hesitation. “If you think that the way I act in bed is an impediment to us being together and want to help me get over it, I’d rather it be you than anyone else.”

My breath stopped and I felt like I’d been sucker-punched in the solar plexus. Dear God, what had I done to deserve this kind of trust from her? “Scully… are you sure?” I managed to say, reaching out to put one hand gently on her wrist where it bent around her knee.

She looked back at me openly despite the color I could make out in her cheeks, not having looked away since her statement that she wanted me to help her. “Yes. I am. We have been many things to each other over the years and I trust you implicitly.”

I let go of her wrist and put my arms out. “Then let’s start with a hug, can we do that?” I smiled reassuringly. “And I’d really like you to stay with me tonight. Sleep here with me,” I amended as she hesitated. “I want to hold you.”

“Just sleep?” she said, dropping her arms from around her knees but not moving otherwise. 

“Just sleep, for now,” I affirmed, stretching my legs out and gently pulling her next to me. Touching her incredibly soft skin and feeling it against mine of course made me even harder and I was sure she noticed so I added, “I can’t help having a physical reaction to a beautiful naked woman but we’ll ignore that for now.”

She was nestled against my chest, arms around me and head against my shoulder. “I’m sure it doesn’t help that I want you right back even if I’m not good at showing it,” she murmured. “I hate leaving you hanging like this, though.”

“I’m fine,” I said, resting the side of my face on the crown of her head. “Come on, let’s get some sleep and we can talk more tomorrow.”

“What do you have that I can sleep in?” she asked, moving away slowly as I got up to retrieve the covers.

“Your skin,” I smiled at her as I tossed the sheet and comforter back onto the bed. “My one unbreakable rule will be no clothes allowed, Scully. We will only dress in our birthday suits when we work on this, okay?”

“I have not slept naked in… I don’t know how long if ever,” she said, getting up and helping me straighten out the covers. For all her earlier shyness she didn’t seem to notice it as much now, perhaps because I wasn’t making a fuss about it. “I don’t know if I can.”

“We’ll find out,” I said easily. “You need anything before we crawl in? Glass of water?”

“No, I’m fine,” she said as she slipped between the sheets.

“Rule number two,” I amended, putting my hands on my hips. “The word ‘fine’ is not allowed in either of our bedrooms.”

She bit her lower lip and I suspected that it was to stop a smile. “I’m beginning to think twice about this.”

I leaned over the bed, bracing my hands next to her arm and gazing down at her meaningfully. “Scully, I’ll tell you right here and now that the only way you’re getting out of this is if you really and honestly tell me you’ve changed your mind, that you don’t want to do this. Otherwise I am going to insist on a session every night starting tomorrow until we’re both satisfied—and I do mean in every way possible.”

She eyed me rather warily but didn’t move away. “Every night!”

“Every night unless we’re out of town on a case,” I repeated as I turned away. “I’ll be right back.”

As I flushed the toilet I wondered if she’d be gone when I got out. I was deliberately pushing her, testing her, trying to see if she’d really meant it. If she left I wasn’t sure what I’d do, but I had to know now if she meant it.

To my vast relief she was still in bed and, I found out as I got in, just as naked as I’d left her. I smiled reassuringly at her, curling on my side to face her and pulling the covers up to my chest. “You okay with this?” I said.

“Almost,” she replied thoughtfully, her blue eyes dark in the dim lighting. 

“What’s wrong?” I asked worriedly, wondering what I’d managed to fuck up.

“You’re over there and I’m over here,” she said with a small smile. “I would really like it if you could hold me tonight.”

I was vastly encouraged that she asked, and was hopeful that perhaps this process wouldn’t be painful or take too long. We slid together into the center of my bed and I gently put my arms around her as she cuddled against me, her front against my side. “I do love you, Mulder, thank you for understanding and wanting to help me,” she whispered, turning her head to kiss my chest. Very shortly I heard her breathing deepen and even out, her body relaxing gradually against me.

I had pretty much gone down but when she touched me I was back at full attention and wide awake--and beginning to wonder if this was such a good idea. I wasn’t sure how good of a psychologist I’d be with a permanent case of blue balls!

***

“Oh my God, Scully, I, ah, um, I didn’t… ooooh Scully, Jesus!”

It was a scene right out of one of my favorite fantasies: Scully’s bright red head going up and down in my lap, her hot mouth wrapped around my straining cock, and of course we were on my couch. How in God’s name had this happened, I thought hazily, trying to distract myself so I wouldn’t shoot in her mouth—though if she kept up that little tongue-flicking thing she was doing on the upstroke I wasn’t sure I’d be able to hold off much longer.

I’d been a little worried when I’d awakened to the alarm alone and tangled in the covers earlier that morning, but to my relief she’d left a note saying that she’d gone home to change and would see me at work. I was still a little uncertain until I walked in to find her behind my desk, using my computer with two full Starbucks cups sitting nearby, steam curling into the cool basement air from the holes in the lids. She’d looked up, smiled a little, and said, “I’ll be done in a couple of minutes.”

“No rush,” I’d smiled back, almost breathlessly relieved that all seemed to be well between us. Gesturing at the cups I said, “Thanks for the coffee. Which one’s mine?”

“Either, both are black with room—you’ll have to use the coffee supplies in the hallway,” she said, eyes on the computer. “I was in no mood for sludge this morning so I figured I’d splurge, stop and get something decent.” It was so normal that I nearly pinched myself to realize that last night had really happened; I knew exactly what she looked like beneath that prim, professional dark blue suit and white blouse and I would see her naked again tonight. Surreal.

For lunch we ate at to a secluded bench in the courtyard where we often went to discuss cases; it was out in the middle of a mostly open area where we could see anyone coming long before they could hear us. We’d gotten sandwiches from the cart and now sat facing each other not just so we could see each other but so that we could also see if anyone came close enough to overhear.

As I unwrapped my chicken parmesan hoagie, I carefully broached the subject that was uppermost on my mind. “Scully, it would help a lot if you would tell me about the men who made you feel like that,” I said low. “If you don’t want to…”

“I do,” she said, setting out her own sandwich on its waxed paper, tuna salad on wheat bread. For side dishes she had a small cup of fruit salad and I had a bag of chips, though of course we helped ourselves to each other’s food. “It’s not easy for me to talk about, but I want you to know.”

I nodded, mouth full. This was very encouraging.

The story she told was probably not unusual but nonetheless sad. She and her senior high school boyfriend had broken each other in and to hear her tell it, it had been messy and painful and not at all pleasant. She’d had sex with him a few more times but it didn’t get any better, so after their breakup she hadn’t slept with anyone until her second year of college. 

Then it was a much older man, a professor she’d hoped would be more experienced. But he had been the first, though not the last, to prefer her to lay quietly while he pumped into her. Once again she felt nothing more than a mildly pleasurable sensation, though by this time she knew damn well she should have felt more. But being young and inexperienced she wasn’t comfortable telling him what she wanted—nor did he encourage it.

Then came Daniel Waterston in med school. He was the first one to tell her that only loose women responded in bed, that they were sluts while a real lady “took her pleasure quietly”. It was all I could do not to say something really rude about that, but I bit my lip and let her continue.

It was during this time she learned to satisfy herself; I was shocked to discover that Scully had not had an orgasm until she was almost twenty-five. But she came from a repressive Catholic family where sex was not openly discussed; in fact her mother hadn’t gotten up the guts to have the sex ed talk with her until she was almost thirteen years old and, she admitted, she’d already learned most of it from Missy and what books she and her friend could sneak. 

Jack Willis hadn’t been much better than her other lovers; from what I got he’d liked more positions than missionary but he cared no more for her pleasure than anyone else had. She didn’t talk much about him but I clearly got the idea that he had only reinforced the “slut” idea that Waterston had implanted in her. She did insinuate that it had been better with him than anyone else, though I suspected she’d never had an orgasm with him either. They had been engaged so briefly that she hadn’t even announced it to her mother; it was only a few days before she realized that she did not want to spend her life with him and broke it off completely.

When she’d come to work on the X-Files, I was surprised to discover, she’d been dating a lawyer only a year older than she was. They’d dated for almost three months before going to bed and yet again she’d found a man who preferred his bed partner to lie quietly and do nothing more than act like she enjoyed it. That hadn’t lasted long; she finally decided that being alone was better than dealing with men who apparently thought she was nothing more than a blow-up doll. Although she’d known that sex should be more than what she’d had due to popular culture references she hadn’t been able to figure out how to change it or, even more importantly, whom to trust with knowing about it. This last was said with a small smile at me.

Scully admitted that she’d never had to fake an orgasm because the men she’d slept with didn’t seem to care; they had, apparently, assumed that she liked what they were doing. She also said that she knew she should have stood up for herself, but she was always uncertain about how or what to say and hence had stayed silent.

Here I did interrupt her, still speaking just loudly enough for her to hear. “Scully, if you ever want to tell me something when we’re in bed, don’t worry about anything but telling me no matter what it is,” I said seriously as we packed the remains of our lunch into the brown paper sack we’d carried it out here in. “Let me make one thing clear: your pleasure is more important to me than anything else, including my own. The better it is for you, the better it is for me. “

She glanced around before saying, “It’s your passion that both scares and attracts me, Mulder. I knew you wouldn’t be the type of man who’d want a partner to just lie there—and I don’t know how to do anything else.”

I wanted to touch her badly, cradle her face in my hands and kiss her, hold her against me, but dared not. Instead I met her eyes and hoped my expression showed what I was feeling. “I want you any way I can get you, Dana Scully. If you trust me I’ll do my utmost to make things between us the best I can.”  
Just then another pair of agents came out into the courtyard and without a word we dropped the subject, getting up and heading back inside.

It was a slow Monday, mostly dealing with paperwork and making a few phone calls. Scully disappeared later that afternoon for a couple of hours for meetings with other pathologists at Quantico, but I stayed in the basement office. Once she was gone I tried to do some research on frigidity on the Internet but quickly realized that this wasn’t the place to do it; I’d have to wait until I was at home. However I did remember that I had some of my old psychology textbooks in the office and it killed nearly an hour before I found them stuffed in the bottom of a box in the storeroom down the hall. Unfortunately they weren’t much help as none of them dealt with abnormal sexuality, so I was pretty much on my own for the time being.

I work best by writing and used a yellow legal pad to jot notes and ideas, writing on the third page with the first two folded back in case someone walked in and I needed to hide it in a hurry.

First and foremost, I thought, was trust. I knew that Scully trusted me outside the bedroom, but how to get her to trust me enough to let go in bed? I’d have to think on that one.

Second, reconditioning. But I thought that might happen as we went along so I didn’t add anything to it although I was going to keep it in mind as a step on its own should need be.

Third, positive reinforcement. That I could do; it would be difficult for me not to, in fact.

Fourth, body image. I had no idea how she saw herself and knew that would be important. She hadn’t seemed to have much trouble with nudity after we’d been naked for a while but I couldn’t assume that. For all I knew, those yahoos who’d slept with her before had told her that she was too skinny or her tits were too small or something stupid like that, so I was going to tell her how beautiful she was and how much I loved her body just the way it was every chance I got. Again that wouldn’t be difficult because it was the truth.

Fifth, past experience. She had already come clean with me about the men she’d slept with and her openness about it was encouraging. It definitely worked hand-in-hand with the trust issue; it was going to be important that she knew I didn’t think less of her no matter what her past experience had been.

Sixth, arousal. I had already figured out that I had to get her aroused enough to let go with me and knew I needed to figure out what really got her going. One of my huge turn-ons was, for some reason I’d never tried to figure out, voyeurism—hence my enjoyment of porn flicks. If she had something like that I needed to discover it; in the meantime I would just pay close attention to what she liked presuming that she wouldn’t come right out and tell me.

That segued into the seventh, communication. That should go higher, I thought, but the list wasn’t written in stone. I had to make sure she was talking to me because it was clear that she often had problems opening up about her feelings. But then so did I, so it’d be an exercise for us both; maybe that would make her feel better about it, I thought.

That was all I could think of at the moment, so I ripped the page out, folded it into squares, and tucked it into the inside pocket of my suit jacket. I’d made sure that her name wasn’t on it and there was no way to connect it to her, although if she found it she’d know who it was about. Hopefully she wouldn’t mind, but then she did know that I worked best by jotting things down.

By the time Scully returned from her meetings I was deep into a possible case about an owl foreshadowing death on a farm in upstate New York. I showed her amid much eye-rolling and spirited arguing, which for me was half the fun of coming up with these things.

Just before we left the office, I went over to where she was sitting in the back preparing some slides and said low, “Come to my place for dinner tonight, Scully? Bring your overnight bag.”

She looked up at me with wide, startled blue eyes but then smiled in a provocative way I’d never seen from her before. “Sounds good,” she murmured back equally low. “See you about six-thirty?”

I nodded and headed across the office for my outer coat. “I’m going to take off now,” I said in a normal tone of voice. “See you tomorrow,” I added, turning to wink at her as I walked backwards toward the door.

She opened her mouth and then I bumped into something solid behind me to an accompanying “oof”. Of course I turned to see our boss standing there, arms akimbo, and spent a good fifteen minutes getting reamed out for being careless before he got around to mentioning that he’d come down to let us know he’d found out that there was a surprise audit scheduled for eleven a.m. tomorrow and we’d better have our ducks in a row because he wasn’t going to be here to cover our asses if we didn’t.

Once he left I just looked over at Scully, grinned and shook my head, and left. I could honestly care less about an audit right now; they always found something to get us in trouble for, so I’d stopped worrying about it years ago. My biggest concern at that moment was what to get for dinner that wouldn’t be too heavy should there be some kind of physical activity tonight—I can be one hell of an optimist if the situation warrants it.

But dinner hadn’t happened—yet. To my surprise Scully was no sooner in the door than she’d dropped her overnight bag and was in my arms and kissing me with a passion I’d only hoped to find in her. This was what I’d thought she’d be like in bed and it gave me a great deal of hope and encouragement.

But as soon as the kiss ended I took her face in my hands and looked down at her seriously. “I want to tell you this before we go any further,” I said urgently. “No matter what happens between us I don’t want to lose our friendship, our partnership. If this begins to tear us apart I want you to know that I’m willing to give up a sexual relationship to keep the rest.”

She reached up and cupped the side of my face in return, smiling slightly with blue eyes warm on mine. “I don’t think it’ll come to that but yes, I agree,” she said. “Can I take my coat off now?”

I stepped back, letting go of her, and waggled my eyebrows. “That’s not all you can take off,” I said with a deliberately overdone leer, loosening my tie which I hadn’t had time to remove before this. “Naked, remember?”

“What, now, while we have dinner?” she said with surprise, pausing to look back at me as she hung her coat on the rack just inside the door. “I, uh, thought it was just in the… bedroom.”

“I think it’s very important that we get used to seeing each other naked,” I said, wondering how much of that was true and how much was simply because I wanted to see her naked as often as I possibly could; that little taste last night had been nowhere near enough for me. Regardless, I was sure it would help with what we were trying to do. “I worked out a plan of therapy this afternoon and that’s one thing I think is very important.”

One arched brow rose as she set her hands on hips, making no effort to undress though I was already unbuttoning my dress shirt. “You did, did you?” she said dryly. “So, how much am I going to owe for this… therapy?”

I forced myself to keep undressing. “Actually you’ve already paid me,” I said, tossing my dress shirt over the back of a dining room chair and resting one hand on the back as I kicked off my shoes. “What, you don’t want to be naked with me?”

“Paid you? How?”

I paused in unbuckling my belt and looked directly at her. “By letting me know that you’re in love with me,” I said quietly. “And trusting me so much, making it clear that you want me to help you. That means the world to me, Scully, you must know that.”

Her posture softened but she still made no move to remove any clothing, not even her shoes as I took off my belt. “I do, Mulder, but I’m not sure about sitting around all evening naked,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest. “Especially while we’re eating, and I do hope you did something for dinner because I am starving.”

I hesitated. I certainly didn’t want her uncomfortable because that wouldn’t help what I was trying to do at all. “All right. Why don’t we get comfortable, at least? I’ll go change into sweats and a t-shirt, did you bring anything?”

“No, just clothes for tomorrow and a bathrobe for after my shower in the morning,” she admitted, picking up her overnight bag and carrying it into my bedroom behind me. 

“You can wear something of mine if you’d like. I did laundry right before I left for England so go through my dresser and pick out what you want.”

I deliberately turned my back but didn’t leave the room as I finished undressing, then walked past her naked to get a clean pair of boxer-briefs and sweats out of the dresser. She was standing at the foot of the bed wearing her blouse and skirt, holding one of my grey t-shirts and watching me with an inscrutable expression on her face. I smiled as I stepped into the underwear saying, “I got Chinese for dinner with plenty of shrimp fried rice for you.”

I decided not to wear a shirt as I’d turned up the heat hoping to get her naked and after putting on sweatpants, I turned back to her. “I’ll go dish it up and meet you in the dining room.” But as I was walking out of the room she called my name softly and I turned to see her standing in just bra and pantyhose, still holding the t-shirt with her other clothes thrown across the foot of my bed. How had I missed her removing more clothes, I wondered. 

“Thank you,” she said softly, her cheeks and upper chest slowly turning pink, but other than that showing no reaction to our states of undress. “I may not express myself well, Mulder, but your understanding and wanting to help me means the absolute world to me.”

I so wanted to go to her but didn’t feel it would be the right thing to do at the moment, so I made a show of looking her up and down appreciatively while saying, “Trust me, Scully, it’s not all altruism. Just the thought of us making love with neither of us holding back is enough to make my head spin. You are so worth waiting for.” I winked and headed into the kitchen and once there, had to wipe my forehead with a piece of paper towel. Jesus, just seeing her standing there like that had really tested my restraint; it now occurred to me that perhaps I should have taken care of myself before she got here, but it was too late to do anything about it now. Still, even wearing fairly snug boxer-briefs there was a noticeable lump in my sweats that I’d just have to try and ignore.

“Mulder? Could you come in here for a moment?”

I set down the serving spoon I was using to dish out the kung pao chicken onto plates and went through the apartment to find Scully sitting at one end of the couch, wearing one of my sleeveless grey t-shirts which reached halfway down her shapely thighs, and from the way it looked nothing beneath it. I got even harder if that was possible. “What is it?”

“Come on, sit over here for a moment,” she said, patting the black leather next to her.

I frowned. This was like a preface to an ‘I’ve changed my mind, thanks anyway’ moment—but the way she was dressed didn’t make that likely. I went and sat down where she indicated, turning slightly and putting my arm along the back of the couch behind her. “Is something wrong?”

“No, something’s right,” she said with a little close-mouthed smile up at me, reaching out to cup the side of my face, running her thumb along my cheekbone briefly and gazing at me with enough emotion in her eyes to make my heart leap. “There is one thing I have no problem doing for you and I see no reason to wait after you’ve been so patient with me.”

Before I had time to react she had swiftly leaned over, pulled my sweats and boxer-briefs partly down and engulfed my hard cock in her hot, wet mouth. I let out a yelp they probably heard in every surrounding apartment as well as on the street four floors below. “Scully?!”

She put a hand firmly around the base and moved her mouth away from me just long enough to say, “Mulder, let me, I really want to do this for you… it’s not altruism on my part either; I love having this little power over you.”

It was the right thing to say. I could only groan as her mouth went back to work, and when she tugged at my clothes I lifted up just long enough for her to pull both sweats and underwear down past my knees, then spread my legs and let her go back to it. 

So here we were, Scully leaning over and giving me what was undoubtedly the best blowjob of my life, both physically and mentally. I rested one hand on her lower back, the other gently covering the hand she had on my opposite hip. I tried not to move at all, not wanting to thrust up into her mouth, but I certainly couldn’t help the noises I was making. 

“Uh, Scully, I’m—oh, Jesus---I’m, um, gonna, I can’t help—really close—!”

Again she lifted her head just enough to speak. “Let go, Mulder, I want you to,” she said huskily, her lips moving against the sensitive head of my cock and making me shiver. “I love doing this for you…”

Dear God, who was I to argue?!

But I ended up having a problem releasing in her mouth despite her urgings and I worried in the back of my mind that she might be getting tired as it went on and on. At least until she glanced up at me sideways, her smoky blue eyes meeting mine while sucking on the head, and then she gently cupped my testicles—that was it. My heart almost leapt out of my chest. Despite the way she’d acted in bed last night, she was not shy in giving head and that tipped me over the edge. I had just enough presence of mind to move my hands from her to dig my fingers into the couch cushions on both sides.

The world stopped, flipped upside down, whirled on its axis. I could only hang on for the ride, seeing stars, my entire body engulfed in the most intense tingling, pulsing pleasure I had ever experienced. For the first time in my life I knew why they called orgasm la petite morte, ‘the little death.’

As I came back to reality Scully released my cock and sat up, snuggling against my side as I put a boneless arm around her shoulders, panting. Without thinking I urged her over into my lap, facing me with her legs on either side straddling my body, and I wrapped my arms tightly around her. Snuggling my face into the warm darkness of where her neck met her shoulder, I gasped, “Oh my God, Scully. Thank you.”

I felt the side of her face move into a smile even as she ran her fingers through my hair on both sides over my ears. “No thanks necessary, Mulder, I meant it when I said I loved doing that for you.”

“You can have that power over me anytime you like if that’s what floats your boat,” I panted, and her responding chuckle shook her small frame.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” she replied in her patented Dry Scully Voice, then added, “Let’s go reheat dinner, I’m starved.”

I almost made a rather rude comment but luckily I’m not that stupid. Instead I urged her to lean back and cupped her head in my hands and kissed her, not caring at all that I could taste my own bittersweet essence in her mouth. It was the taste of her, the feel of her against my body, knowing she loved me that I cared about—and showing her the same in return.

When I let her go I rested my forehead against hers and breathed, “I love you so much it’s almost scary, Scully.”

“Same here, Mulder… it’s… spooky.”

I sat back and looked at her, then we both burst into raucous laughter. The serious mood broken, we got up and went to reheat dinner as she’d requested, laughing and talking with the same comfortable friendship we’d had for so many years now. It was as if we’d never seen each other naked or crossed that unspoken line, yet there was a sense of expectation in the air that had never been there before.

After we’d cleaned up dinner I finished wiping off the dining room table—I’d preferred to eat there instead of at the coffee table in the living room so I could sit across from her and see her better—then tossed the dishrag into the sink and went in search of my errant partner. To my complete surprise I found her sitting on my bed stark naked. Pausing in the doorway, I admired the view for a few moments then said, “My educated guess would be that the nudity no longer bothers you?”

“Your expensive education wasn’t wasted, I see. Good guess, Doctor Mulder,” she said with that flirty little close-mouthed smile at me. She was leaning against the headboard, several pillows behind her back, with her legs crossed at the ankle and hands folded demurely in her lap. “Your patient’s all ready for her first appointment.”

God, what had I done to deserve this woman? Was this karma from being good in a past life or what?

I wasted no time in shedding my few clothes and joining her on the bed. Everything I’d planned today flew right out of my head as I sprawled out next to her, resting my head in her lap and wrapping my arms around her waist. Her gentle but distinct scent drifted to me, warm and musky and immediately arousing. Good thing I was laying partly on my stomach. “Jesus, you smell good,” I muttered, rubbing my nose on the soft skin on the top of her leg. “I kid you not, I haven’t smelled pure woman in so many years I don’t remember how long it’s been. I’ve missed it and you are sheer perfume to me.”

One of her hands skimmed down my back, the other brushing my hair back from my forehead. “You have a photographic memory, Mulder,” she said in a soft teasing voice. “You don’t forget anything.”

‘Then that tells you how long ago it was,” I said, unable to help kissing the soft skin of her upper thigh. To my surprise she parted her legs and the rich musky scent of her unmistakable arousal brought me to full hardness again despite my earlier orgasm. “Oh, God, Scully, you’re killing me,” I groaned in unexpected honesty. “I want to taste you so bad—”

She slid down a little so that my head ended up on her stomach and I turned to look up at her. “Why don’t you?” she said softly, gazing at me with heavy-lidded eyes. “No one’s every done this to me before and I wouldn’t mind finding out what it feels like.”

“Your wish is my command—I would love to.” Was this the same woman who had lain limp and unresponsive, her face turned away, last night? I was so aroused that I didn’t really think twice about it, just got up on hands and knees and moved between her legs, pushing them gently apart as she slid down even more, only her head and shoulders on the pillows now. Propped on my elbows I slowly, gently parted her lips then leaned forward and took my first taste of her. God, she was ambrosia: musky, sweet, rich. Her labia were like wet silk, glistening with her pearly arousal as I gently swiped my tongue up and down around her entrance.

I love to go down on a woman. Unlike some men I don’t find it smelly or gross; just the opposite, in fact, with the right woman. And she was one; God was she one!

But as with last night she gave little to no response at all although she was certainly physically aroused; by now she was nearly dripping. This time, however, I didn’t let her lethargy stop me. Instead I went ahead and took my time exploring her, gently sucking her lips into my mouth, inserting my tongue into her soft, warm, tight canal (that got a faint jerk of her hips), gently moving her folds apart with my fingers, and then slowly circling her swollen clit with my tongue. I decided to be a bit selfish and just enjoy myself; even if she didn’t respond I could tell that she liked what I was doing just by the physical signs. Maybe, I thought, if I got her worked up enough she would lose control. Worth a try!

I suckled gently on her clit, feeling it throb and swell even more, and reached up with both hands for her full breasts. I ran my fighters lightly over the hard buds, feeling her quiver beneath my touch. Then I reached down with one hand and sank a finger into her tight, hot canal, pumping gently in and out as I continued rub at one nipple and suck on and tongue her hard, swollen clit. I could tell I was having quite an effect on her by her physical reaction and hoped that she would just loose it and—

Suddenly I felt her inner muscles clench around my finger and her thigh muscles tightened on either side of my head. Her clit throbbed under my tongue as she let out a faint, whispery gasp even though her body remained unmoving. It took me a moment to realize that she’d come and I backed off, removing my finger and gently licking away the arousal around her labia before raising my head to look up at her.

My heart constricted when I saw the dazed look on her face, cheeks brightly flushed and eyes unfocused. I used a corner of the sheet to wipe my face then crawled up her body and rested mine lightly on hers, taking her face in my hands and kissing her lightly, lovingly, showing everything I felt for her. She wrapped her arms around my shoulders and kissed me back passionately, clearly not minding her own taste on my mouth which I hadn’t been sure about; I knew some women didn’t like it. We slowly broke apart and I rested my head on her chest between her breasts, sighing happily. “I’m so glad I could do that for you,” I told her, kissing the soft inside curve of her breast. Her heart was galloping along, more evidence of her orgasm.

“That was… that was another first for me, Mulder,” she said, breathless and low.

“Really?” I raised my head. “How?”

“It’s the first time I’ve ever had an orgasm with a man,” she confessed, her cheeks pinkening even more. “I’ve done it by myself, as I told you this afternoon, but I’ve never come with someone else before.”

I didn’t let on that I’d suspected this. “You’d never gotten off with a man? Not even the younger one you were dating when we met?”

“Not when he told me that women who act like that are whores and sluts, though I’d hoped he might be the one I could let go with.”

So it had been at least three of her five who’d told her that—and she’d been aware that she had a problem long before going to bed with me. Interesting. “Christ! How long did you date him?”

“For another couple months after that, although we only had sex a few times.”

“He was fucking crazy, outright goddamn insane to treat you like that.”

“Thank you, Mulder.”

“It’s just the truth, Scully. A woman as beautiful and passionate as you should be enjoying sex, not enduring it.”

“I got used to telling myself that being wanted was enough, although I did get aroused during the act and got quite proficient at quietly taking care of myself afterward.”

That explained her stillness and the lack of any voluntary reaction besides a faint gasp when she came. I reached up and took her face in my hands, making sure her eyes met mine, and said intensely, “I want to make you scream when you come if you want to, Scully. I want you to let go with everything you’re thinking and feeling. Never be afraid to show me how you feel, okay?”

Her eyes were suspiciously bright as I leaned forward to kiss her. “Mulder… I want you to finish inside me.”

My heart hit the roof of my mouth before rebounding to pound frantically in my chest. Now I was the one at a loss for words. “Wha… what?”

“I can feel how hard you are,” she said, smiling softly at me as she rubbed the inside of her knee against my cock. “I can’t stand leaving you hanging like that again.”

Oh, God, there was nothing more I wanted than to bury myself in her warmth and go to town, but I knew that her unresponsive body would cool me down before long and that wouldn’t be good for her self-worth. “I’m all right, really,” I assured her. “Don’t you worry about me; we’re here to help you. Besides, what you did for me earlier was plenty, believe me.”

“Are you sure?”

“I am,” I said, giving her another kiss before rolling off and pulling her against my side. “Don’t worry, it’ll go down eventually.”

“I really want you inside me, Mulder,” she said low as she put one arm across my stomach and tangled her legs with mine. “God, that felt good.”

“It did,” I agreed. “But I can’t until you can respond, Scully. That’s what does it for me. I won’t be able to enjoy myself if you’re just lying there, so we have more work to do.”

She huffed against my shoulder, then settled down with her warm, soft body pressed firmly against my side like she’d always fit there. “Hmph. Work?”

I grinned and kissed the top of her head. “The single most enjoyable ‘work’ I’ve ever done,” I chuckled. “And look what the payoff will be.”

“Are you holding that out as a carrot, Mulder? Being inside me?”

I thought about it for a moment. “No, it’s my honest reaction, Scully. It’s something I can’t help, needing to have you respond. It’s not something I’d want to change about myself anyway.”

She hummed, sounding sleepy. “Okay then. In that case let’s get some sleep, what do you say?”

It was barely nine o’clock but I couldn’t resist having Scully sleep in my arms for a while even if I did get up later. I dragged the covers up over us and settled down, surprised to wake to the alarm almost twelve hours later.

***

The next day before the audit took place we were sent out to assist Skinner in North Carolina on the Morley case, to my relief. We had agreed to be complete professionals and nothing more than friends while out of town; this, we found out, was easier said than done.

By the time we got back to our motel I figured she was too tired to come to my bed even if we hadn’t already agreed not to while out of town. We’d stopped and had a brief dinner with Skinner after she did the autopsy on Jim Scobie, coming no closer to figuring out what’d killed him when we discussed it over our entrees. After dinner Skinner had driven off in the opposite direction when we left the restaurant; I didn’t know where he was staying but apparently it wasn’t the shithole we had, as usual, gotten stuck in. With no more than a mumble of “good night” at each other we went into our separate rooms and I figured that was the last we’d see of each other until the next morning.

But of course there was a knock on the door almost as soon as I’d gotten most of my clothes off and was standing in just underwear. Thinking it might be Skinner, I yanked my suit pants back on as they were closest to hand but didn’t bother with a shirt before going to answer it. Through the peephole I was a little surprised to see Scully standing outside with arms crossed. She was still in her work clothes except for the suit jacket and shoes. “Everything all right?” I asked as I opened the door.

She walked in as I stepped back then closed the door behind her. I was getting concerned with her uncharacteristic silence and about to ask her again when she crossed the few steps between us in a blink and was in my arms, pulling my head down to her, kissing me with the unrestrained passion I was already addicted to. Her tongue stroked into my mouth as her hands dove into my hair, her lithe, slender body pressing frankly against mine. 

I wrapped my arms around her waist and held her against me, meeting her tongue with mine as I kissed her back with equal enthusiasm. I could get used to this, I thought hazily, Scully coming through the door and straight into my arms. As our lips slowly parted she murmured, “I’ve been wanting to do that all day.”

“Right back atcha,” I breathed, backing away towards the bed while holding her against me. “It was tough to keep my mind on whatever the hell it was we were investigating when all I could think about was the way you taste and that hot little noise you made when you came.”

I fell back on the end of the bed, carrying her with me. She sprawled over my body, holding my shoulders, smiling close-mouthed down at me as we fell. “Oof! Unlike you, who alerted everyone in a ten-block radius when you finished.”

I laughed, holding her waist with both hands while she propped her arms on either side of my head. “Was I really that loud?”

She leaned down and kissed me briefly, her lips warm and soft and eminently arousing, as was the feel of her body sprawled on mine. “Loud enough to make me want to do that for you again,” she said huskily, her eyes darkening as she gazed down at me. I had begun to get hard the moment she kissed me and those words finished the process, although I was rather uncomfortably pushed to one side from the way we’d landed.

“Oh, God, Scully,” I rasped, then cleared my throat. “We’re, uh, not supposed to—“

She laid a gentle finger over my lips. “We already have by my being here,” she pointed out. “May as well be hung for a lion as a lamb.” Then she began to slide down my body, hands caressing my bare chest and then moving down to my waistband as her smoky blue eyes held mine mesmerized, and I was helpless to—

Knocking on the door shattered the quiet of the room. We both froze, eyes wide as we stared at each other. No matter who it was, us being caught like this was so not good. I felt myself wilt, which was good, as we both scrambled to our feet. My mind racing, I grabbed Scully by one shoulder and pointed to the easy chair on one side of the dresser, shaking my head when she indicated the bathroom.

Gazing through the peephole while smoothing back my hair I saw, as I had half expected to, Skinner standing outside with his arms crossed and foot tapping. He was dressed in sweatpants and a t-shirt and gym shoes. I opened the door, raising my eyebrows as if surprised. “Sir. What are you doing here?”

“I’m staying here, Mulder. Had to run to the drugstore for a few things I forgot when I left the restaurant earlier. I saw your light on and wondered if you’d like to go for a run,” he said, stepping forward. I gestured him inside and as I closed the door, saw him staring daggers at Scully, who was curled with her feet beneath her, skirt demurely pulled over her knees in the overstuffed chair and, I was tickled to note, had the TV remote in her hands though the TV wasn’t on. She, too, had fixed her hair and clothes and looked as coolly confident as ever. “Agent Scully.” He said with clear displeasure, then glanced back at me and dipped his eyes, clearly indicating my bare chest. 

“Sir,” she said calmly, tapping the remote against her knee absently as if she’d forgotten she was holding it. She looked completely relaxed and unconcerned about being caught in my room, not as if we’d been madly groping the shit out of each other a few moments before. “Mulder and I were just discussing my autopsy findings. Again.”

He was still frowning but didn’t seem quite as angry or suspicious as time passed and neither of us acted guilty or concerned. I walked over and sat down on the edge of the bed right where we’d landed earlier as the covers were already mussed there. “Isn’t it a little late to be going running?” I said, gesturing him to the other end of the bed as there was nowhere else to sit in the room.

He shook his head slightly. “Yeah, but I can’t sleep after the last couple of days. Damndest thing. So, either of you feel like going for a run?”

“Oh, not me, “ Scully said, uncurling her legs and setting her feet on the floor, arching her back slightly as if sore from sitting in one place for too long. Man, she was good! “Thanks anyway, but I’m off to bed.”

I put my hand out. “Can I have the remote back now?” I said with some exasperation as she stood up. It was then that I noted she was barefoot as well as shoeless; how had I missed that detail before? That meant that she wasn’t wearing pantyhose beneath the skirt and I had to struggle to push away the mental image that brought on.

Scully raised a brow as she tossed it to me. “Next time don’t try to pretend you’re listening to me when you’re really watching TV and then I won’t take it.” Yeah, she was good all right.

Skinner snorted laughter but didn’t remark as she said goodnight and let herself out.

“I’ll go if you can give me five minutes to change,” I said, standing up.

“Take your time,” he said, sitting in the overstuffed chair Scully had vacated. “I’m in no big rush.”

I got my sweats and socks out of my suitcase and changed in the bathroom, wondering if we had really fooled him as easily as it seemed we had.

“You and Agent Scully seem to be getting… really close… lately,” Skinner said a few minutes later as we jogged along at an easy pace.

“We have been,” I agreed. “Although for a while there I was afraid that crap with Diana was going to drive her away.”

I saw him turn to look at me although I didn’t look back. “From the Bureau?”

“Maybe, but definitely from me and our partnership,” I dissembled. “I don’t know if it was a woman thing or what, but something tells me that a male partner wouldn’t have had such a problem with her.” Inspiration struck as I turned to look at him. “Sir, have you ever had a female partner?”

His brows went up toward his nonexistent hairline. “No, actually, Mulder, I haven’t. It’s got to be a… challenge.”

“It is.” I was trying to decide how much to say without raising his suspicions now that they seemed to be tamped back down. “And, honestly, especially with one that looks like she does.” I shook my head. “Be a lot easier if she looked more like my buddy Mina in Requisitions.”

Skinner laughed. “I can’t believe you haven’t nailed her yet, Mulder, and I don’t mean Mina,” he said, surprising me with his candor. 

I felt stung and decided to react how I probably would have if he’d said this to me a week ago. “How do you know I haven’t?” I challenged.

“Give me a break. However, it’s clear how you two feel about each other. How do you keep your hands off her?”

I snorted laughter while feeling deep relief at his words. “I try to think of her as a sister,” I said dryly. “And she really is my best friend, that’s no lie. But I think we’ve agreed, unspoken, that the job is more important, at least for the time being.”

“Why do you have to choose?” he said, looking forward so that I couldn’t clearly see his expression when I turned to see if he was serious or yanking my chain, as he’s been known to do. “I’m sure that there have been plenty of partners who’ve had sexual relationships and no one ever suspected, and I don’t mean just male-female ones either. If you keep it discreet and outside of work I don’t think anyone will care—me least of all.”

I was honestly and truly shocked and I hadn’t thought I could still feel that particular emotion after all I’d been through the past few years. “Really, sir? With regs and all—“

“That’s more to put a stop to any type of sexual harassment than to the decisions made by two consenting adults. Shit, I’d ask her out in a heartbeat if I thought she’d go for me,” Skinner said, surprising me again. He glanced over and laughed shortly. “That’s man-to-man, Mulder, not superior-to-subordinate. But it’s clear where her heart lies.”

“Do… do you really think so?” I said hesitantly, thinking about how I’d wondered about this very subject just a few days ago. “I’d like to think she feels the same for me but you know how she is, hiding how she feels about just about everything other than my theories, which she so obviously enjoys blasting apart.”

He nodded as we slowed for a red light, traffic darting back and forth through the intersection as he jogged in place and I took the opportunity to stretch. “You seem to be the only one who doesn’t know it,” he said in a rather smug tone. “But if you two do end up together just don’t trumpet it to the skies, keep it under wraps. And if you do plan to make a move on her, wait until we’re done with this case,” he added as we crossed the street. “Goddamn pain in the ass…”

“Don’t you mean pain in the neck?” I quipped, and bit back a laugh at the look he tossed me. The rest of our run passed without discussion and as Scully’s light was off by the time we returned I didn’t bother her that night, as much as I’d have liked to continue what we’d started. 

***

The day after that was my unforgettable inhalation of the beetle-larvae-laden smoke, and it was a good three weeks before I could even begin to think about anything sexual again. I had, of course, seen Scully outside of work—in fact I’d stayed with her for the first few days I was out of the hospital—but we hadn’t so much as mentioned or insinuated anything outside of our friendship. For that time it was like our encounters had never happened.

I was beginning to worry that perhaps she didn’t want to pick up where we’d left off when she called me shortly after I got home on a Friday night the week after I started back to work. “Scully—to what do I owe the honor?” I teased in my raspy voice.

“Don’t be a smartass, Mulder, or I won’t ask you over for dinner tonight,” she said in an equally teasing tone.

“Dinner?” I perked up.

“Yeah, you know that thing people do in the evenings when they’re hungry? Some of us even cook it rather than ordering it,” she said dryly. “I take it you’re interested?”

“Do bears—“

“They do, so be here at or close to eight,” she cut me off with laughter in her voice. “Bring nothing but yourself. See you then.”

I hung up smiling. Hopefully Doctor Scully would give me a clean bill of health and if I was lucky, let me drag her off to her bed after dinner for a little foolin’ around. Hell, even the couch would do at this point, I thought as I went to change into jeans.

As I’d hoped, I was barely inside the door before we jumped each other; I never could decide who grabbed who this time. Our bodies were glued together from chest to hip, mouths slanting and tongues dueling and hands grasping. I held the back of her head in my hands, fingers deep in that thick, soft hair and I felt her arms around my waist, hands stroking up and down my back beneath my t-shirt. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt anything as good as Scully touching me.

“As tempting as it is to just drag you off to the bedroom, let’s eat first,” she said as we reluctantly parted, her comment tickling me that not only did she think it, she was comfortable enough to tell me. “Besides, I cooked.”

I perked up. “That’s damn near as good as fooling around with you,” I rasped, smiling. 

She laughed, taking me by the hand and leading me to the dining room table. “That remains to be seen,” she said. 

Dinner turned out to be a chicken and rice casserole with a sour cream sauce that went down easy on my sore throat and tasted really good as well. “That was delicious, Scully,” I told her as I helped her clean up. “And it didn’t hurt my throat. I think that’s the first thing I’ve eaten in weeks that didn’t.”

“That’s what I was hoping for,” she said, taking the dishtowel from me. “I’ll finish up in here, Mulder, why don’t you go get comfortable? I’ll make us some tea and join you in the living room.”

Hmn, comfortable. When I said that it meant naked, but did she? I didn’t want to assume but on the other hand I didn’t want her to think I wasn’t up to finishing what we’d left off a few weeks back. I most certainly was; in fact, I’d taken care of myself before coming over so my own arousal wouldn’t distract me from what I hoped to do to her. I decided to leave my clothes on and let her take the lead, see where she’d go with this. I could only hope that she wanted to continue her “therapy.”

We ended up sitting on the couch with mugs of the Alaskan rose hip tea she liked, talking for God only knows how long. The tea soothed my throat and I was mostly content to listen to her despite my growing impatience. She curled up against me as if she’d been doing it her whole life and I didn’t remark on it, just put my arm around her and held her against me as if I’d been doing it my whole life. It was possibly the most normal evening I’ve ever had in my whole life.

It wasn’t until the conversation began to falter that I realized perhaps she wasn’t comfortable with being the aggressor; that would certainly fit everything that had happened between us so far. But just as I thought that she sat forward, dislodging my arm, and set her mostly-empty tea mug on the coffee table as she turned to me. Putting one hand on my upper thigh she said, “So, Mulder… want to stay the night?”

I almost made my “does a bear” comment again but decided that perhaps it wasn’t appropriate. Instead I leaned forward and kissed her, not touching her anywhere else and hoping that the kiss would tell her everything she needed to know. Next thing I knew I was sprawled on her couch with Scully on top of me, grinding her pelvis down on my rapidly growing erection while her hands did amazing things to the other parts of me she could reach. I was in such an erotic haze that it took me a while to realize that she was all over me with no hesitation or shyness, but I was also in no position to think much about it. All I could do was react, but luckily that seemed to be the right thing.

We came up for air sometime later after nearly falling off the couch, and I reached for my cup of cold tea, desperately needing something on my sore throat. “Hang on, I’ve got something better for your throat,” she said huskily, stumbling to her feet and disappearing into the kitchen. I sat up slowly, adjusting myself carefully even though my jeans were unzipped. She got me aroused to a point that I wouldn’t have believed possible even as a teenager; knowing that I probably wouldn’t be inside her tonight made it even worse.

She returned with a clear plastic cup full of a thick, bluish liquid with a dome lid and a straw. “It’s a banana-blueberry cream smoothie,” she said, handing it to me. “Let me know how that goes down.”

I sucked on the straw as she sat down next to me again. The burst of rich, icy-cold sweetness was ambrosia both to my taste buds and to my dry, sore throat, and I had to deliberately slow myself so I didn’t suck the whole thing down in one fell swoop. As it was I took in over half of it in that first taste. “God, that’s perfect, Scully,” I rasped as I let go of the straw. “Where’d you get it?”

“Jammer Juices on the way home. I thought that might do the trick,” she smiled, clearly relieved. “What do you say we head for bed now? You can bring it with you,” she added.

As we got up I leered at her. “I wouldn’t mind drinking it out of your navel.”

She laughed, bumping my arm with her shoulder. “Only if you wash my sheets afterward.”

“Okay, so maybe we could try it in a motel sometime.”

I ran down to the car to get the overnight bag I always kept in the trunk, then we took turns in the bathroom. When I came out the apartment was dark except for a dim light in her bedroom and she was in her big, soft bed, sitting propped up on a few pillows with her bare shoulders showing above the quilt. Seeing this made me remember our first time a few weeks ago and how she’d insisted on being under the covers in the dark—and that was a lot of her problem, I realized. When we were outside the bedroom or even in bed without covers over us she was a lot more open and responsive.

I decided to test my theory. I undressed, laying my jeans, underwear, and t-shirt neatly on top of my overnight bag, which was on the chest at the foot of her bed, and then I slipped under the covers with her. But to my surprise—and relief—she didn’t put out the dim lamp on the bedside table on her side, instead rolling over towards me and reached out. I had never completely gone down and now her hands found my semi-hard cock, bringing me fully erect with barely a touch. “God, I want you, Mulder,” she breathed, stroking up my length with one hand and cupping my balls with the other. “How’s your throat?”

“What’s a throat?” I said, reaching for her in return, thrilled to find her naked. “Scully—do you want—“

“I want to taste you again,” she half-whispered, then dove beneath the covers and took me in her mouth. 

I had really wanted to taste her, too, but in this case I was no good at multi-tasking; between my throat and what she was doing I knew I couldn’t concentrate on her at the same time she was touching me. All I could do was caress her shoulders and head, all I could reach. What really got to me was that while her mouth was busy her hands were as well, reaching around to cup my ass and then down my legs and back up over my hips and caressing my chest and tweaking my nipples. Not only was she making me feel thoroughly loved and wanted and needed, but the additional sensations were bringing me close to finishing far faster than I would have guessed after my earlier relief.

Long before I wanted to, I had to stop her. When I pushed the covers back so I could see her she looked up at me, clearly puzzled, and I said, “I want to get you off first, Scully. It’s late enough that I’ll probably pass out right afterward and I’m not going to leave you hanging like that.”

“Mulder, you don’t have—“

I cut her off, urging her up to me. “I know that, but I want to,” I said, feeling my body ache for her as she let go of me and scooted up so that we were face-to-face. “All I’ve thought about the last few weeks is tasting you, feeling you tremble under my hands, hoping I can get you to make a noise when you come. Don’t deny me that.”

She fell on my mouth, kissing me with a wild passion that made my head spin even more than it had earlier. Though we sometimes joked about it, she really did keep me guessing; when I thought about the first time we’d started to have sex, it was hard to realize that this was the same woman in my arms. But I knew that, should I roll her over and try to enter her that way, she’d probably just shut down like she had before. I didn’t want to rush things just yet; I had a lot more planned for us before we tried that again.

“God, I love you so much, Mulder, you are an amazing man,” she murmured against my lips as we parted reluctantly. “I’ve never felt a tenth this much with anyone else.”

“Right back atcha, beautiful lady,” I breathed as I slid down and rolled onto my back. “Come on up here, Scully; as much as I love kissing you, I want to taste more of you.”

She drew back a little, frowning in the dim light. “I don’t…”

I tugged her towards me, wondering if perhaps I was pushing too much too fast, but this was one of my favorite positions and I wanted to do it with her. “Kneel over me,” I said persuasively. “I’ll move you into position.”

She resisted, but not too strongly. “Mulder, I’m not sure I’m comfortable with—“

I interrupted her again. “Please? I want to taste you this way, Scully. I can have my hands all over you at the same time and you can move freely so that my mouth is exactly where you want it. Indulge me.”

She took a deep breath as I pushed the sheet and quilt back even more. I guided her into position as she carefully swung one leg over my face with her knees above my shoulders, both urging and gently tugging on her when she hesitated. Despite her demurrals I found her very wet and swollen, and the moment I touched her with my tongue her whole body jerked. I held her bottom, gently kneading the soft skin and firm muscle beneath, exploring her with lips and tongue and moving her just a little bit now and then. I felt her begin to relax and moved my hands up, feeling the contours of her narrow waist and then cupping her full breasts and kneading them gently as well. God, I had missed this so much during my years of celibacy; there was no way to truly imagine the taste and feel of going down on a woman no matter how good an imagination I had.

Once again she was completely silent as I managed to bring her off, although her breathing was irregular and she was gasping soundlessly as I felt her inner walls contracting around my fingers, her vulva swelling even more. She relaxed back onto my chest and I moved my arms to the other side of her legs and helped her slide down until she was sitting on my waist, panting down at me with eyes at half-mast before collapsing on my chest. I could feel the head of my cock bumping into her ass and it was all I could do not to slide her further back; I could be inside her in three seconds and a thrust if I wanted to. But no, I would much rather wait and—

Obviously the same thought had occurred to her because before I could do anything else, she had shifted and was moving back, my cock sliding between her legs and trapped between my belly and her hot, wet softness. But her face was buried in my neck and I put my hands on her ribs, urging her to lean back so I could see her face. “Scully—Scully—I need to see you,” I rasped. “Look at me, Scully, please.”

But she didn’t, probably couldn’t yet. And neither could I. As badly as I wanted to thrust up into her willing body, I couldn’t do it like this; I felt like I would be ingraining her earlier conditioning if I did. Although it was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done in my life, I lifted her off of me and laid her next to me, rolling onto my side and holding her tightly against me with an arm under her neck and the other around her waist. “God, Mulder, what is it?!” she cried out low, wrapping one arm around my chest with the other bent under her head. “Don’t you want to be inside me?”’

“More than anything on this good green earth, Scully,” I groaned into her ear. “But I can’t do it like this, with you unable to look at me or move or respond. I have to know you’re with me.”

She snuggled closer, her face still in my neck. I bucked against her involuntarily and she threw a leg over my hip and rubbed her soft, taut belly against my erection. I groaned and bucked against her again, the friction just right. “Come on, Mulder, finish like this,” she whispered, pushing her hips against me again. “I can’t bear to leave you hanging, either.”

I moaned out loud and was lost; I hadn’t dry-humped since high school but I couldn’t stop myself. Holding her tightly against me with the arm around her waist, I thrust and rubbed against her until I came a short time later, squirting hot and uncontrollably between our bodies. Even this, with her, was far better than anything I’d shared with a partner previously. “Oh, Scully, oh God,” I groaned as I came down from the euphoria, my head spinning, still holding her tightly against me. “Jesus, you make me crazy.”

“Was that… was that good?” she asked softly. 

Despite feeling like I didn’t have a bone left in my body, I lifted and turned my head, found her mouth, and kissed her until we were both breathless again. My throat wasn’t feeling so hot but I ignored it for now. “Everything with you is good,” I finally rasped, letting my head fall back limply. “You are amazing, incredible, and more adjectives along those lines I simply can’t think of right now.”

She sat up, smiling softly down at me. “Come on, let’s get cleaned up,” she said, untangling herself from me and scooting towards the side of the bed. “I’d rather not have to change the sheets; I just put these on when I got home.”

I followed suit, moving carefully so I didn’t drip. She held a soft washcloth under warm water and washed us both off, playfully but firmly batting away my hands when I tried to do myself. On the way back to bed I finished my half-melted smoothie, which soothed my throat to a decent comfort level. When we were curled together under the covers again, still naked, she sighed a warm puff of air on my shoulder and murmured, “I want to try making love with the light on and looking at you, Mulder. I need you inside me so badly I can’t tell you.”

Her words made me shiver even as I yawned with exhaustion. “Tomorrow,” I told her, already dozing. “Tomorrow.”

But, as always, that wasn’t to be. We were awakened by her phone at four a.m. with the news that Skinner needed us in the office ASAP despite the fact that it was Saturday; there had been a bomb threat at the airport and all available personnel were being called out to Dulles.

I bolted home to change while Scully went straight into work and we met there, then took one of the fleet cars out to the airport. We weren’t released until nearly midnight, and at that point we agreed with a look to go to our separate apartments for the night; we were totally beat. We rode back to the Hoover together to get our cars but that was it. We weren’t able to manage a kiss goodbye with so many other people around, though we shared another look that was nearly as intimate as we got out of the car.

The next day we were sent to Kansas City on the Templeton/Pfeiffer case; it was well over a week before we recovered enough from our injuries on that one to even think of anything sexual. Luckily we were kept in town until considered healed enough to go back out in the field.

I was fed up with all these delays and suspected that Scully was too. On a Wednesday evening two weeks after the Kansas City case I did some surfing and research on the Internet and then made reservations for Friday and Saturday nights at what appeared to be a nice B&B less than an hour from D.C. Lastly, I shot Scully an email saying to not make plans for the weekend, to pack a bag for two days, and to be ready when I picked her up at her place Friday after work. I got a response back a few minutes later agreeing but wondering what was going on; I didn’t reply nor did either of us mention it at work the next two days.

When Scully opened her apartment door Friday evening I was met by arms akimbo and a quizzical look. She was dressed casually in snug new jeans with a plain blue scoop-necked t-shirt tucked into them and looked fresh and young. “Mulder, are you going to tell me why I had to cancel lunch with my mom tomorrow afternoon?”

“Not yet,” I said easily, closing the door behind me. “You trust me, right?”

“Yee-ah,” she said slowly, looking at me like I might suddenly morph into the Fluke-man.

“Then give me your cell phone.”

That got the eyebrow, but she handed it over. I took mine from my jacket pocket and carried both of them into the living room, where I made sure that they were turned off and then set them on the coffee table. When I turned back to her, both eyebrows were nearly at her hairline. “Mulder…”

“If you don’t trust me, don’t come with me,” I said quietly, going over and picking up her small suitcase from just inside the door.

“Jesus God, Mulder, who on this planet do I trust more than you?” she said with some exasperation, picking up her keys from the table and her black cloth jacket from the back of one of the kitchen chairs.

I waited until she joined me at the door and then leaned down and kissed her without touching her anywhere else; I knew if we got started here we’d never leave. “Thank you,” I murmured against her soft lips. “You won’t regret it.”

***

Two hours later we were tangled together naked on the huge, high poster bed in the Victory Arms Bed & Breakfast in Culpeper, VA. I had picked it partly because I found the name amusing on several levels, but it had also gotten good reviews on the online travel sites. Luckily it was off-season or we probably wouldn’t have gotten a room, especially not for two nights.

But it was well worth it to see the look on Scully’s face when we walked into the room. Though it was a bit frou-frou for my taste, she clearly loved it and thanked me the best way possible. We barely had our bags set down and the door closed before we were in each other’s arms and ended up on the loveseat in the sitting room. I had planned to talk to her about the course of therapy I wanted to work on before we did anything but those plans were tossed out the proverbial window when Scully straddled my lap and about kissed me breathless, rubbing her small, lithe body against mine in the process. 

I had the list I’d made weeks before in my pocket and had planned to pull it out and discuss it with her, but that was quickly forgotten. I had a passing thought that perhaps the therapy was going a little better than I’d initially surmised, but that was soon swept away as I wasn’t thinking much of anything coherent. 

Almost before I knew it we were both topless, then she climbed off with a warning for me not to move and removed my pants and underwear, then hers. When she climbed back on me I was still clueless, thinking she was just sitting on my lap, until she grabbed both of my wrists and pushed them over my head against the wall behind the loveseat, holding them firmly with her strong hands. Even as she did that she was lifting up and almost before I knew it or realized what was happening, she had impaled herself on me.

Despite my size I slid up into her moist, hot body with little problem and a lot of incredible friction. She let go of my wrists to grab my shoulders, inhaling sharply as she leaned back. I think I cried out; the sensations were so sudden and vivid that I was almost overcome. Her eyes were closed, head tilted back, face pointed at the ceiling… but she wasn’t hiding in the dark beneath the covers, still and unresponsive. She had initiated this and as I wrapped my arms around her slender body and pulled her against me I whispered, “Thank you,” into her throat before kissing my way up it and across her face to her mouth. She lifted up almost hesitantly while we were kissing and I held my body still, waiting to see what she’d do. Slowly, maddeningly gradually she lifted up then sank back down, using her legs, now holding my head as we kissed wildly. Even though she wasn’t making a sound she was responding and, even better, initiating and that roused me to heights of passion I hadn’t known I could feel--again. It was all I could do not to grab her hips and slam myself up into her; I knew it was important that she do this on her own. But after only a few more of her slow strokes I suddenly realized that I was right on the brink; she had aroused me past the point of no return. 

“Oh God, I can’t hang on,” I groaned as I broke the kiss and moved so that we were cheek to cheek, reaching down and holding her hips steady above me. I slammed up into her once, twice, and on the third I brought her down on me and I was gone, over the peak, finished. I cried out her name in a long, drawn-out moan, ducking my face into her shoulder as I trembled and shuddered and jerked beneath her. “Jesus, Scully, you make me crazy,” I finally breathed, turning to kiss her. She kissed me back with soft, undemanding lips and wrapped her arms around my shoulders, relaxing her body against mine as I sagged back against the loveseat. “Holy shit, I’m sorry, I couldn’t help it—you had me that aroused.”

“No worry, Mulder,” she murmured, kissing my neck and sounding rather pleased with herself. “I know I took you by surprise.”

I reached up with one hand and cupped the back of her head, gently tugging on her hair, urging her to lean back. “The best surprise of my life,” I smiled at her when I could see her face; she looked both happy and rather smug. “How long have you been you planning that?”

She smiled, meeting my eyes steadily. “I’ve been waiting for the right opportunity for a while now,” she admitted. “I had to have you inside me again long before you thought I was ready.”

I cupped the side of her face. “Guess I should have trusted your judgment, and I’m sorry this went so fast…” I urged her to lean back a little more and let go of her face to reach down between us.

“You don’t have to do that,” she protested weakly, but I felt her jump as I found what I was looking for. I was still inside her, softening but not gone yet, and I wanted to get her off before I slipped out.

“I know, but I want to—hell, I need to after what you just did to me,” I said as she leaned forward, resting her forehead on my shoulder but not hiding her face in my neck like she had that first time. I still had one hand on her hip and I used that to hold her steady as I rubbed and circled her clit, paying attention to the cadence of her breathing and the way her hips occasionally jerked ever so slightly. It wasn’t long before I heard the hitch in her breathing that signaled her orgasm and felt her entire body quiver, and I slowed my rubbing to a gentle stroking as I felt myself finally slip out of her. “I love you, Scully, you are the most arousing, amazing woman ever.”

I turned my head and met her mouth as I wrapped both arms around her and held her close against me. This kiss was long and languid and sweet, no urgency, just enjoying and savoring each other. Finally I felt her shifting and asked, “Your legs getting cramped?”

“Yeah, although if not for that I could stay like this forever,” she sighed, then carefully moved each leg back until she was standing. She put her hands out and I let her pull me up, wrapping my arms around her shoulders and holding her against me. “Feel like seeing if the tub’s big enough for us both?”

“Sounds like a plan,” I breathed against her soft hair. “As long as I don’t have to let go of you yet.”

Unfortunately I discovered that the B&B had a communal bathroom for the four-room second floor that we were on, which I hadn’t known about or I probably wouldn’t have booked here; why hadn’t anyone on the Internet travel sites mentioned this, I wondered. We got dressed to check it out and took turns using it. 

When I got back to the room Scully was lying naked on the bed waiting for me. I all but ripped off the sweatpants I’d put on and joined her there, already growing hard again. My body’s reaction to her stunned me; I’d never have guessed I could be like this with a woman. In fact previously the best I’d done with another woman was twice in twenty-four hours with Phoebe at her insistence, and that was before school in the morning and next at nearly midnight. I could only hope my body’s reaction to Scully would keep up as long as possible.

“Wow, Mulder,” she breathed as we came together face-to-face in the middle of the bed. I loved the feel of her taut, toned muscles beneath that silky skin, her perfect breasts which were neither too large nor too small, and most of all the way she looked at me when we touched. “Don’t you ever go down?”

“It’s all you, beautiful lady, all you,” I told her, reaching down and grabbing her ass so that I could grind against her firm belly. “In case you hadn’t noticed, I can’t get enough.”

“In case you hadn’t noticed, I can’t either,” she breathed against my lips, then kissed me with the unrestrained passion I was completely and utterly addicted to. We rolled over several times on the huge, king-size poster bed and came to rest near the foot with her sprawled atop me, still kissing and groping. I desperately wanted to be inside her but wasn’t sure how she’d handle it being in a bed, although we were outside the covers and it was still light out; on top of that, I’d turned on the small lamp on the bedside table before hitting the mattress. There was no time like the present to find out one way or another.

“I want to be inside you again,” I murmured as the kiss slowly broke. “Won’t stop you this time either if you slide down on me again.”

She exhaled slowly, lifting herself on her arms over me and straddling my waist. I ran my hands up and down her toned arms and over her shoulders, deliberately ignoring her breasts for the moment as she gazed down at me with full red lips parted and eyes unfocused. She was carefully trying to align us, although neither of our bodies seemed to be cooperating at the moment. Finally I reached down between her legs and held myself still as she once again impaled herself on me, only slower this time so that a long, low groan was forced from me as her hot, tight wetness took me in. She drew in a deep, slow breath and threw her head back as I disappeared into her. 

“Oh, Scully, this is the best,” I managed to say, trying to tug her down on me. “C’mere, I wanna kiss you.” She tilted her head to look down at me, a sexy little smile on her flushed face. I was absolutely thrilled that she could meet my eyes, and grinned back at her encouragingly. “My god, you are the most stunning, arousing, beautiful woman I have ever seen,” I breathed, and I meant it. 

“And you are the sexiest man on the planet, and you’re all mine,” she whispered back before falling on my mouth. Then I was lost in a haze of sensation as we began to move together, my hands on her hips more guiding than demanding, thrusting up into her downstroke. I let her set the pace and was perfectly happy to follow along, licking and sucking at her soft mouth. Although it was no stranger to me anymore, I made it my goal to map out the inside of her mouth as far as my tongue could reach, wanting to know it as well as I knew my own down to every ridge and bump of her molars.

But finally I realized I was getting close and didn’t want to end this is yet. “Want to try a different position?” I murmured against her lips.

“Yeah, my legs are getting a little tired,” she agreed, slowly lifting up and then moving to the side. I groaned at our loss of contact but didn’t plan for it to be for long.

“Hmn... how about from behind?” I said, getting up on my knees. “Go to your hands and knees,” I urged, moving around behind her. She did as asked, still without so much as a sigh or gasp. But as I spread her and slowly slid in I felt her shiver slightly but noticeably. I moved my hands to her hips and just held her steady as my hard cock penetrated her, her natural lubrication easing the way considerably. “Everything OK?” I managed to say, pausing. Since I couldn’t see her face and I wasn’t sure she’d protest if she didn’t like it, I had to make sure. “You like this?”

Her breathing hitched and I just barely heard her say, “Yes, ohhhh… Mulder, yes.”   
I bottomed out with the head of my cock against her cervix and my tight balls touching her body. “Oh my God,” I breathed, pausing and leaning over her back to kiss and suck at the soft skin down her spine between her shoulderblades. “I have never felt anything this good in my life, Scully; you are magnificent.”

Slowly, gradually I began to stroke in and out, taking my time and savoring every slide against her warm, soft, tight walls. I wrapped one arm around her slender waist and used the other to brace myself on the mattress so all my weight wasn’t on her back, still kissing and licking along her spine. I was now glad I’d come so fast when she’d impaled herself on me earlier; if not for that I’d never have made it half this long, especially going this slow and—

A faint noise caught my attention, and I had to be careful not to miss a stroke. Had that been Scully moaning? She wasn’t moving, though her back was arched and I could see her hands clenched in the bedclothes. “Is this good?” I asked, though I was damn sure of her answer again. “You have to let me know; I can’t see your face.”

“Yessssss,” she whispered, and again I heard that faint, breathy moan.

“What?” I said huskily, drawing out slowly until only the head was still inside her, and paused. “I couldn’t quite hear you.”

“Oh, God!” she cried out in a low but clear voice, and backed against me so suddenly that I slid deep inside her, her hair brushing against my face as she threw her head back. “Please, Mulder!”

My heart stuttered in my chest but I didn’t hesitate; this was what I had been waiting for. She had, God help me, finally let go. “Gladly, Scully,” I gritted out between clenched teeth. I rose up, grabbed her hips, and let myself go. I pounded into her as hard and fast as I had been dying to, and this time I did hear her moans and faint cries of “oh!” over the sound of my own panting and the groans I couldn’t hold in as well as the slap of my belly hitting her ass. And while she didn’t exactly match my rhythm, I could feel her hips rocking slightly beneath my hands and made sure I didn’t hold her too tightly to move. She was getting even wetter, I realized, and I made my strokes shallower so I wouldn’t risk popping out with as slippery as she was.

“I’m getting close,” I slowed and warned her a short time later. “Do you want me to keep going like this or—“

“On top,” she gasped, turning her head to the side so I could hear her. “Get on top.”

I knew that this was a huge turning point for her and hoped that we were both ready. With as aroused as I was, I was afraid I couldn’t keep my mind on making her focus on me but I had to try since she’d managed to ask me.

I slid out and helped her roll over, then before she could do anything else I laid on top of her and took her face in my hands, resting my elbows on the outside of her shoulders, her hands on my waist. “Look at me while I make love to you, Scully,” I said huskily, gazing down at her beautiful, flushed face as I pressed my lower body forward. I felt her hips move beneath mine as she helped align us and my heart jumped; this was the first time I’d felt her move at all in this position and it was a breakthrough. “God how I love you,” I groaned as I found her opening and once again slid into ecstasy, fighting to keep my eyes open and steady on hers. Her newfound response, as tentative as it was, was enough to nearly drive me crazy with longing and need. “You’re making me crazy, Scully.”

Her soft red rosebud mouth was open, eyes staring up into mine with a glaze of desire I had once never believed I’d see there. She mouthed “love you” although I didn’t hear her voice, but that was good enough for me; this was clearly the breakthrough we’d been working so hard towards. I began to stroke in and out of her while still holding her face, but it was an awkward position and I knew I’d have to let go of her. Here was the final test; once I didn’t hold her in place would she go back to her old ways?

“Talk to me, Mulder,” she said low as I moved my hands to just below her shoulders and rose up over her. She was running her hands up and down my upper arms now, and had her legs wrapped tightly around my hips.

“I… don’t know what to say,” I managed to get out.

“Anything,” she said, still gazing up at me although I saw that her eyes wanted to close. “I need to hear your voice.”

It was then that I remembered the book of love poems I’d stumbled across a few weeks back in her apartment. I’d glanced through it, remembering most of them from college, and noted that she had two of my favorites in there. This was one of those times that my eidetic memory would come in damn handy because I didn’t even have to think about it, I just recalled the poem I wanted and let it roll.

“We cannot live, except thus mutually  
We alternate, aware or unaware,  
The reflex act of life: and when we bear  
Our virtue onward most impulsively,  
Most full of invocation, and to be  
Most instantly compellant, certes, there  
We live most life, whoever breathes most air  
And counts his dying years by sun and sea.  
But when a soul, by choice and conscience, doth  
Throw out her full force on another soul,  
The conscience and the concentration both make  
mere life, Love. For Life in perfect whole  
And aim consummated, is Love in sooth,  
As nature's magnet-heat rounds pole with pole.”

Scully’s eyes were slightly glazed but still gazing up into mine as I spoke in cadence with my thrusts, and when I was finished I swear I saw tears in them although I couldn’t be sure. “Love, by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, right?”

“Right,” I breathed. Then I laid flat on her, sliding my hands beneath her ass and lifting her to me. We were now cheek to cheek, me with my face in her warm, damp neck and her lips against my shoulder. “I’m not too heavy, am I?”

“No,” she replied just as softly, wrapping her arms around my shoulders. “Oh, God, Mulder. This is exquisite.”

“Yeah,” I agreed as I began to stroke in and out of her slowly but firmly, pressing my fingers into her soft flesh on each downstroke so that her hips rose to meet me. “Got another… by Byron. Reminds me… of you.”

I felt the shiver that rippled through her entire body. “Yeah?”

It wasn’t easy to talk, thrust, and breathe in that position, but I managed. 

“She walks in beauty, like the night   
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;  
And all that's best of dark and bright   
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:  
Thus mellowed to that tender light   
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,   
Had half impaired the nameless grace  
Which waves in every raven tress,   
Or softly lightens o'er her face;  
Where thoughts serenely sweet express   
How pure, how dear their dwelling place.

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,   
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,  
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,   
But tell of days in goodness spent,  
A mind at peace with all below,   
A heart whose love is innocent.”

This time I heard her low, soft moan clearly as her body writhed against mine despite how I was laying on her. “I’m so close,” she gasped.

My heart leapt at her breathy words in my ear. I was nearing the edge myself. “Can you come with me, Scully, like this?” I asked, shifting my arms to under her shoulders so my full weight wasn’t resting on her chest, rising up on my elbows so I could see her. “I wanna watch you come.”

“Oh yeah,” she breathed. “Oh, God, yeah.”

Making sure I was rubbing my pelvic bone against her clit—or at least I hoped I was—I began to thrust fast and shallow. Her eyes fell closed but her face was tilted up towards mine and I got to watch her orgasm reflected there, desperately holding off my own so I could see this and cement it into my memory. But her inner muscles had barely finished contracting around my cock before I was gone over the edge, lost in the astounding, bone-deep, mindless pleasure that only she gave me. I managed to keep my eyes open and was aware when she opened hers and looked up at me as I cried out wordlessly. Knowing she was openly watching me come when only a few weeks ago she couldn’t help keeping her face hidden enhanced my orgasm to almost-unbearable levels; when it was over I was trembling and soaked in sweat, barely able to hold myself up on top of her.

After a short time I had to roll off of her; I normally liked to stay on top of a woman as long as I could and Scully in particular even more so, but I was thoroughly exhausted and afraid I was going to pass out. When I did move I slid an arm beneath her neck and pulled her against me, lying on my back with her pressed against my side. Neither of us spoke, and as I dozed off my last thought was that all the weeks and months and angst and worries had been so well worth it.

Scully woke me an hour or so later simply by getting up; I immediately missed the warmth of her and mumbled, “Where you going? Come back here.”

“Well, Mulder, number one, it’s barely nine o’clock and I’m not sleepy any more; number two, I have to use the bathroom; and number three, I’m getting hungry. Aren’t you?”

I stretched, watching her go over to her suitcase and take out clean underclothes. “I could probably sleep more but yeah, food does sound good now that you mention it.”

“Since you’re treating for the accommodations, dinner’s on me,” she said, pulling on the jeans she’d been wearing earlier over clean panties. I opened my mouth and she raised a hand, the other holding her shirt. “No argument, Mulder, I want to.”

I sat up and swung my legs over the edge of the bed. I felt renewed twitches in my groin as I watched her tug her t-shirt down over her flat belly. This would be a lifetime record for me, three times in twenty-four hours, but I wasn’t complaining should I happen to get fully hard again. “I wasn’t going to argue; I was going to say that I don’t know what’s open this time of night around here,” I said. “Be funny if we had to go all the way back to D.C. for dinner.”

As I stood up she came over and wrapped her arms around my waist, pressing her dressed body against my naked one. “This may sound a little odd, Mulder, but thank you,” she said, tilting her head up to look at me as I put my arms around her shoulders. “I feel… I feel like I’m free,” she said softly, her eyes going far away for a second before focusing on mine again. “You know, I knew something wasn’t right about most of my experiences in bed, but I didn’t want to look at it too closely and now I’m very sorry I let it keep us apart for so long.”

I hugged her to me, enjoying the feel of her hands stroking up and down my bare back. “Everything and anything I do for and with you is time well spent, Scully,” I said into the charmingly mussed hair over her ear. “As for the wait… maybe we’re like fine wine or cheese; the longer we age, the better we are.”

She laughed and leaned back in the circle of my arms, smiling up at me. “I’m not used to you being the optimist, Mulder, but I could get used to it.”

I leaned down and kissed her briefly, then slapped her denim-clad bottom before I could get too much more aroused and not let her go anywhere. “You’ve got me hungry now—let’s go see what we can find.”

She flashed me another bright grin over her shoulder as she turned away, reaching for her shoes. “I’ll be right back.”

The lack of a private bathroom had me reconsidering staying here tonight, but Scully obviously loved the room so I guessed we’d put up with it, although I was going to cancel tomorrow night’s stay even if I had to pay for it. No wonder I’d been able to get a reservation at such short notice, I thought grumpily as I got dressed.

But my mood improved when Scully returned, her hair neatly brushed and makeup repaired, wearing fresh lipstick though I was sure that wouldn’t last long as I already wanted to kiss her. By looking at her you’d never know she’d been having wild, uninhibited sex not an hour ago; though dressed casually she looked calm, competent, professional. I couldn’t wait to muss her up again, but in the meantime my stomach was grumbling so I ignored the first impulse.

But near eleven o’clock when we got back from dinner at an Appleby’s, I was already getting hard for her thinking about what we’d done earlier. I was also curious to see how she’d respond to me on top again if I didn’t do anything special and pretended like she’d never had a problem in the first place.

Once we were in the room Scully, as I’d come to expect, swung into my arms for a long, sweet kiss that quickly turned passionate. I hoped that this would never change because it made me feel wonderful; I couldn’t remember ever feeling like this with any other woman. It was knowing that she wanted me as much as I wanted her despite her earlier conditioning that made things so special between us. She held my face in both of her hands as she kissed me, and just the way she was in my arms brought me to full arousal before she’d even touched me below the waist.

I, of course, took it a step further and immediately began running my hands over her, leaning down to cup her ass and grind my erection into her soft belly. Finally I broke the kiss and murmured, “Up to going back to bed?”

“Mmmmnnnn… I was hoping you’d say that,” she half-whispered back, her lips moving across the side of my face to my ear where she tugged on my earlobe before sucking it into her mouth. I moaned and bucked against her body, then got a better grip on her and hoisted her up against me as I stood up straight. She wrapped her legs around my hips and held on with her arms around my shoulders, letting go of my earlobe and kissing down my neck as I carried her across the room to the bed. “I’ve never felt like this before… you get me so aroused… never knew I could.”

“You make me feel the same way.” I laid her down on the mussed sheets, adding, “Let me undress you, Scully.”

She stretched as I reached down and pulled off her sneakers and socks, rubbing the bottoms of her feet firmly so that I didn’t tickle her. As I moved to the waistband of her jeans I looked up to see her watching me and I couldn’t help but smile. “What are you grinning about, Mulder?” she said, smiling back. “You gloating that you finally have your partner right where you want her?”

“Gloating, no; thrilled, yes,” I said, drawing her jeans down her slender legs. “You know I’ve been in love with you a long time, and wanted you even longer than that.” At my urging she sat up and I swept her t-shirt off, leaving her wearing only a matching black satin bra and panties set, not fancy or embellished or lacy but incredibly arousing for its simplicity nonetheless. “You stay put,” I told her as I pulled off my shirt, then quickly shed the rest of my clothes.

I leaned over her and ran my hands down her body, cupping her breasts and feeling the difference of her skin against in the material, which was not as soft or silky. When I reached the panties I went ahead and dragged them down her legs, finding my patience suddenly at an end and no longer in a mood to tease. “God, I can’t wait, I need you so bad,” I told her, climbing onto the bed over her as she scooted up. My tip was already probing for entrance as I breathed, “Are you ready for me, Scully?”

“Mulder, all you have to do is look at me and I’m ready.”

She was right, I found as I slid in with very little resistance despite how tight she was. I was freshly amazed at how she was wet and ready for me; I almost couldn’t believe that I did this to her. But then she had the same effect on me; God knew I’d never gotten hard three times in one day before this!

Without really thinking about it I slid my hands under her shoulders and leaned down to kiss her as I began to move, long slow exquisite strokes in and out of her. Although she made no sound, she kissed me back passionately, arms around my shoulders, and I felt her hips moving beneath mine, matching me stroke for stroke. She was still wearing the bra and feeling the texture of it rubbing against my chest was incredible, the cool satin versus the warm softness of her skin being a noticeable difference. 

It wasn’t long before I found myself speeding up, then lifted onto my arms to look down at her. She met my eyes steadily, hers soft and loving, her soft red mouth open and sucking in breaths in time to my strokes. “I love you so much, Scully,” I breathed down at her. “You are—you are—“

I let my words trail off as she began to run her hands over my chest, just brushing my nipples which sent little electric jolts though me. Though she didn’t speak I could see everything she was thinking and feeling in her face, her eyes steady on mine although I could tell that the lids wanted to fall shut. Finally, realizing somewhere in my sex-hazed brain that she probably couldn’t finish like this I got up on my knees, grabbed a pillow and stuffed it beneath her hips so that we were at the same height, and rasped out as I gazed down at her beautiful body spread out before me, “Tell me how you like this if you can, Scully, let me know, God I wanna make you come.”

Still without moving but mostly buried inside her, I reached down and gently rubbed her clit, watching her face and hoping against hope that she could tell me if I was doing it right. I’d never done it in this position and wasn’t sure I was using the right pressure at the right angle or if there was enough lubrication. She let out a long, low moan of a kind I’d never heard from her before, gazing up at me with wide, almost-startled eyes, her fingers digging into the covers on either side of her body. I felt her inner muscles contract around me and began to stroke in and out of her, feeling myself almost peak as I realized that she was coming.

“Mulder, oh God, how I love you,” she cried out, eyes still on my face but unfocused, and I did let go then. There was no way I could have held on, the combination of emotion and physical sensation totally overloading me on every possible level despite the fact that I had already ejaculated twice in just the last couple of hours. I managed to keep my head just enough to yank the pillow out from beneath her and fell on her body, cushioning myself on my forearms so I didn’t crush her, thrusting and pumping into her with everything I had, totally losing control with her for the first time. I didn’t worry about her reaction, was she enjoying it or responding, I just let myself go knowing that she was with me. 

When I came back to myself after a stunningly intense orgasm, I was lying on her with full weight just barely holding myself up so that we could both breathe, my forehead on the ball of her shoulder, and her soft mouth puffing soft breaths on my neck and shoulder between gentle kisses. Her hands were running up and down my sides, then up over my shoulders to cup the back of my head as I managed to raise it just enough so that I wasn’t pressing down so hard on her.

“Jesus you are wonderful, Scully,” I finally breathed. “I’ve never lost it like that before, not with anyone else or even by myself.”

She hummed in total contentment; I didn’t have to be a mind-reader to know how she was feeling. She sounded like I felt. “You want to keep testing me like that, Mulder, you go right ahead.”

I hadn’t fooled her. I hadn’t fooled her at all. I laughed softly and turned my head to kiss her, finding her lips ready and warm against mine. The something occurred to me and, as much as I hated to get up at this moment, I forced myself to climb off of the bed.

“Mulder, where are you going? Don’t leave now,” she said, reaching for me as I moved away on shaky legs.

“Hang on, Scully, I need to do this,” I said, reaching for my jeans. From one of the front pockets I pulled out a well-folded and dog-eared piece of yellow paper, unfolding it as I walked back towards the bed. I showed it to her, making sure she read enough to see what it was. “This was my, uh, plan of sexual therapy for you,” I told her as I pulled it back. Then deliberately, holding her eyes, I tore it into as many small pieces as I could. “I should have known,” I said as I let the pieces fall unheeded to the carpet, “that you wouldn’t need anything as simple or as complicated as conventional therapy—you always keep me guessing, Scully, and that is the main thing that totally addicts me to you. All you ever needed, I think, was to know that someone loved and desired you back with the same passion that you have for everything in your life. And I do.”

“You’re the only one who ever could have, Mulder,” she said, swinging her bare legs over the edge of the bed, standing and looking up at me with her eyes showing everything she was feeling, sharing every bit of the love and trust we had for each other. “I know that now. I was just waiting for you.”

I leaned down and kissed her, then enfolded her in my arms and held her as close as I could. “One in five billion indeed.”

finis


End file.
